New Digs

Thomas moved into his new apartment a few weeks ago, after spending some weeks visiting our fold out in the sunroom.  OK, so I all it an apartment, and he calls it a house.  It's actually a duplex, so let's split the difference.  In either event, it's on the southern end of SoBro, which is the southern portion of South Broad Ripple, so he is now one of the cool kids.  Or not.  Oh well, he's close the the library, the police station and the fire station, all within a few blocks radius of his house.

He's living with one of his buddies, Ben, and my fourth child, Chris, who is in his element in his very first apartment.  Ben, not so much, since he had a good job at Lockheed Martin as an engineer or, as he called it, The Restroom Grand Tour, since he basically spent his whole day wandering around the building with the excuse of looking for a restroom..  After a few years of the grand tour, he ditched it all and came to Indiana, and is now tutoring some Indian kid up north, making more money than I do as a nurse.  But I digress.  Chris has the small, corner room and seems to be as happy as a clam.  Thomas got the big room and is still wondering why, since he really doesn't care.

Thomas' biggest complaint was that they needed a table.  Jim tried to give him our smaller kitchen table, but he declined, saying that they didn't have room for it.  Jim doubted this, and I just shrugged, till I was told by the heir to the throne that he couldn't believe that I hadn't seen his new digs yet.  "I mean, Dad has been here, and you haven't.  What's wrong with that picture?"  I went over, and his dog promptly bit me (see previous post), but before I toddled off to Medcheck, The Heir told me that it wasn't that they didn't have room for a table, it was that they needed a bigger table than what Jim had offered.

That afternoon, they followed my advice, went to the furniture store up the block and pad $50 for a dining room table, which was promptly taken home by the four of them, carrying it he-man style down College Avenue.  I wish I had pictures.  Or video.

They needed a bigger table because they like to play games, and the card table they were using wasn't big enough.  Seth spends lots of time over there, hanging out (it's closer to his internship than we are), or just hanging out with his bros.  I suppose when school starts, they will still hang out, because it's only a few minutes from Butler, where Seth will be living on campus.  And so it was that Thomas gave Seth a key to the house:

And Seth loves it.  I thought at first it was plastic, but Seth told me today, as we were waiting to pick up his car from Walmart's automotive department, that it's not only metal, but it has some weight to it, "so when I swing my lanyard around, I thought that maybe it would kill someone if I hit them with it."  This digressed into a conversation about how perhaps this is why Goths love Hello Kitty, because of the danger element.

Who knows.

Parents' Day Out

This was Family Weekend at Butler University.  Seth was anxious to have us come over and hang, but for what, he had no idea.  Apparently, they only email the schedule of events to the parents, and mine went missing until the night before, where I dug it out of the depths of emails I had gotten while on vacation for two weeks.  Electronics.  At best, a mixed blessing.

I had been texting back and forth with Seth all week, trying to figure out the plan, so finally on Friday, I sent him the web page explaining the weekend.  He replied "not much of interest," which kind of surprised me.  Butler goes all out, so they had everything going on from football, high ropes, drum circles, tours of the planetarium and Clowe's, to, of course, basketball.  He immediately replied, in typical Sethanese fashion, that he hadn't seen that you needed to click in order to see the list of events.  Oye vay.  He told me that we should just come over and hang, and maybe we could go watch the rehearsals for The Nutcracker (one of his friends is playing in the orchestra) or do a tour or two.  Then he told me not to come over early, because he was really tired, and his best friend was there spending the night, so he knew he'd be up late.  

This spiralled into a circle of confusion that lasted until the next afternoon, when I had given up hope of getting together and started cleaning and doing laundry.  Of course, that was when I got the text asking when I was coming over, because he was now up (it was 12:07pm).  More texting.  More confusion, and we agreed that he would come here for dinner, and I would go there at 2:30.  I called him when I was almost to campus, and was met with a "you're coming today?  I thought you were coming tomorrow!" Oye AND vay. He told me to come on over, because he and his lady friend were just hanging out.  Truth be told, in the flurry of texts, I was the one who messed up the details, but we were both fine with it, because it was a great time.

Did we do any of the Family Weekend events?  Nope.  We went to Starbucks on campus, where one of his roommates works.  We ended up sitting there for three hours, just chatting, while more and more of his friends and their parents wandered in.  I ended up finding out the following things:

1.  If you have a Scottish brogue and order water in a restaurant, you will more than likely be met with "we don't have that."  And Seth's buddy's mom can switch from the brogue to an American accent at the drop of a hat if she's thirsty.

2.  If you have a college student who comes home to do laundry, you are not allowed to order out.  Seth's girlfriend was offended when she went home to see her family and do laundry, but mostly to have a homecooked meal, and they decided to order Chinese takeout.  She felt deprived.

3.  Seth's roommate woke up to an unaccompanied female sleeping in the other roommate's bed.  Apparently, said roommate left to go do things and left his girlfriend sleeping in his bed.  Not cool.  

4.  Seth's posse includes Catholics, Jews, Lutherans, agnostics, and atheists, to say the least. Their political leanings vary from ultra conservative to liberal to apolitical. Their majors vary from violin to pharmacy, physics to creative writing.  One of his friends is British, and another is Polish.  Needless to say, the conversations are VERY interesting.

5.  Starbucks has these fantastic Refresher things that don't have coffee in them, and that taste AMAZING.  And Seth's girlfriend orders the same lattee at Starbucks as I do.  Serendipity and all that.

6.  The laundromats in the dorms don't take quarters, so when the internet is down, you can't do your laundry, because debit cards won't work.  Seth has yet to bring laundry home, but it's coming, I'm sure.

7.  You can make the Spare to the Throne unbelievably happy if you bring him back three boxes of salt water taffy from Florida.  He was almost giddy.  Yes, he loves the stuff that much.

8.  Seth's girlfriend understands Sethanese!  This is no small accomplishment, folks.  

Yes.  I have hope for our future, because these kids are amazing. 

Hell Hath No Fury Like a Jillie Scorned

Disclaimer: I know what my parents will say when they read this.

Last week, Dan and I were messing about in the yard. He of the paintbrush was doing as painters do, and I was just hanging out. Had the Big Butt dog out there, and the Whirling Dervish as well. Just a nice relaxing evening. On a Tuesday. (Make note of day.)

Dan decided that he would go up front and bring back the trashcans, since trash day was long gone. The Whirling Dervish followed him and, since that monster only listens to male voices, he wouldn't come back to the back. I warned Dan to send him to the back yard, and Dan assured me he would keep an eye on him, and he was fine. And yeah, he should've been, because he only listens to men. No joke. I can talk till my heart's content, and he won't budge till he hears a male voice, even if it's a block away.

Three hours later, I was vacuuming in the living room, and suddenly realized that I wasn't being chased by that squirrely puppy. Asked Dan where he was, and got the typical mumble from a husband who's not really 100% invested in the conversation. I asked him again, with The Tone, and he suddenly looked at me with a look that told the whole story. He hadn't let him in. We had no idea where he was. It was just starting to get dark, so we got in the car and went out looking for him, figuring maybe he'd be running in circles around someone who was out walking their dog. There were TONS of people out walking that night. Walking is the key word here, because there was no dog tripping them by running in frantic orbs around them.

We looked at each other with a "you tell Jill look." Nobody really wanted to say a thing, cause she was upstairs doing her teenaged angst thing in her room. So, I waited till she came down the Pattern Central, and casually mentioned that "oh, by the way, you realize we have no idea where Rocky is, right?" Unhappiness reigned, then sadness when the reality hit that he was likely gone. We went out looking for him every day since -- except Thursday, when Jill left for school, and we got to spend several hours in the car with her, much of which was spent listening to Taylor Swift (that's a whole different story).

Jill swore, before she left, that she could hear him barking from far away. I believe her, because there was one time -- yes, the parents were here -- when Timmy got loose and ended up at the Humane Society. Jill walked in that back room and I swear, she recognized his bark in the caucophone of 100 dogs, and walked straight up to him with no guide to take her there. She HEARD Rocky now, as well. I have to admit, I did too. Not all the time, but sometimes. On Sunday, Seth and I jumped in the car and drove around, because I not only heard him, but when I yelled him name, he barked back to me. Of course, we didn't find him, but we did give some guy a startle when we slowed down and stared at him as he was walking his older-version-of-Rocky dog. I finally got out and told him I really wasn't a stalker, and explained what had happened.

And then, on Monday afternoon, Animal Control called Jill and said they had Rocky. Well, I'll be double dipped. So, of course, it was up to me to go get him when I got off work, so I walked into the pound and announced that I was there to get Jill's dog. The woman who shall henceforth be called Hater Bitch (HB), immediately told me that I couldn't get him, because she would have to pick him up herself. The other saintly woman, henceforth known as Terri, cause that's her name, said that "her daughter is only 17, so we can do it." Me being me, and being honest, cause I'm a preacher's kid, I said "no, she's 18, but she's 3 1/2 hours away at college."

Well then it was on like Donkey Kong. HB recognized her opening and said nope, she's going to have to fax us her ID AND a letter saying blah blah blah blah blah, to which I responded, you know, I can tell you ANYTHING about this dog. No matter, HB wanted ID and a letter, blah blah blah. So I informed her that I was gonna call Jill and SHE could tell her the whole thing, and why she wouldn't let me have her dog. "I see no reason why I should talk to her," says HB, to which I responded "You don't live with a teenaged girl. I'm not taking the blame here, and YOU can listen to what she has to say about all of this." And so it was that I handed her the phone and let Jill get her instructions. When she handed the phone back, Jill was pretty frantic because, beind new on campus, she didn't know where a fax machine was. I reminded her that she only had about ten minutes before Animal Control closed, at which point HB said "No. She has EIGHT minutes."

If looks could kill, HB would not be here today.

I sat there fuming, waiting for The Brat to call me back or fax or something, when Terri came over and said "why don't I go ahead and get your id and copy it, just to get things started?" That was when I knew it would be ok. So we're chatting whilst she does this, when my phone goes off. It's Jill, who is beside herself, because she had run all the way across campus, barefoot, nearly mowing over The Hot Guy in her dorm in the process, but the library didn't have a fax. I told her to run to the Bursar's Office, and she said she didn't have time to get there before they closed. At this point, she yelled "let me talk to that lady. I want to talk to her." At which point, I told her to be nice, because we were now dealing with someone reasonable. I handed my phone over to Terri, who listened, handed the phone back, and said "I'll be right back," and headed right to the manager's office.

"Oh God, girl, what did you say to her," I asked, to which Jill replied "I yelled at her. I want my damn dog back." That's the point at which I realized that my darling Bratty Girl has turned into her mama, cause she ain't taking no crap offa anyone. Good thing Terri has teenagers in her house, cause she was feeling my pain, I'm sure. She came wandering back over, looked at me with a purposeful look and said "OK, is the dog's name Rocky?" "Yes." "Is he neutered?" "Yes." "Is he microchipped?" "Yes." "Ok then, I guess he's your dog," she said, with a wink.

So that was how, after a week of being gone, driving probably fifty miles through a neighborhood that's only a few blocks square, hanging up flyers all over, and putting up with a lot of guff from The Brat, that Rocky returned home, after a week of being gone. And also, I might add, how the microchip information got changed to my name.